Building resilience

We all get knocked down by life. Resilience is what helps you get back up. Find out more about resilience and how you can work on building yours up.

   

What is resilience?

Resilience is the ability to cope with challenges or changes in your life.

Resilience can also be described as:

  • Bouncing back after difficult times
  • Dealing with hardships and still holding your head up
  • Giving things a go or trying your best
  • Being strong on the inside
  • Being able to cope with what life throws at you and shrug it off
  • Standing up for yourself
  • Getting back into shape after you’ve been bent or stretched

What helps develop resilience?

Some things that can help develop resilience are:

  • Being optimistic
  • Good friendships
  • Having a sense of self-worth
  • Supportive family relationships
  • Having positive expectations
  • Having a sense of belonging
  • Being active in the community
  • Problem solving and communication skills

What can I do when I’m facing a challenge?

You can start to build resilience by asking yourself:

  • How can I help myself?
  • What can I control?
  • How can I adapt?
  • What can I learn from this?
  • Who can help?
  • How can I use this to improve?
  • How can I move forward?
  • What’s the positive in this?

   

"Through dealing with challenges, you can learn to build resilience and find that courage you didn’t know you had."

   

How to build your own resilience

There are lots of things you can do to build up resilience. Here are some ideas:

   

Don't give up

Don't give up

Learn from mistakes

Learn from mistakes

Maintain a healthy lifestyle

Maintain a healthy lifestyle

Accept change as part of life

Accept change as part of life

Keep things in perspective

Keep things in perspective

Nurture positive thinking

Nurture positive thinking

Stay connected with supports

Stay connected with supports

Create strategies to self soothe

Create strategies to self soothe

Take action and work towards realistic goals

Take action and work towards realistic goals

Improve communication and problem solving skills

Improve communication and problem solving skills

Talk to someone and get help when you need it

Talk to someone and get help when you need it

Learn to see opportunity in all things

Learn to see opportunity in all things

Developing self-awareness

Another important step to building resilience is to develop self-awareness.

It might be useful to explore:

  • What are my needs?
  • What are my goals?
  • What are my limits?
  • What are my beliefs & values?
  • What are my strengths?
  • How do I normally respond to stress?
  • What are my frustrations & joys?
  • How am I emotionally strong?
  • How have I overcome things in the past?

   

Everyone can be resilient

You might still feel stressed at times but it’s how you deal with it that counts.

If you need some support to deal with life’s challenges, give us a call or start a WebChat  today.

You can also check out Medicare Mental Health for other digital services and resources.

"We can’t be resilient all the time, but it’s important to remember that resilience is something that can be learned and improved on."

   

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Call 1800 55 1800 or start a webchat

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This content was last reviewed